No Sweetness from Obama on Rosh Hashanah

Karin McQuillan served in the Peace Corps in the Muslim country Senegal, in West Africa. She is a retired psychotherapist and author of mystery novels set in Kenya. Her political writing has focused on Islamic facism, liberal and Jewish victim psychology and the Nazi connection to the modern jihadi movement.

This week Jews across America celebrate Rosh Hashanah, the Jewish New Year, and received holiday greetings from our President that were remarkable for their offensive preachiness. Beyond a perfunctory wish for a sweet New Year, Jews got a lecture on the Two State solution. American Jews were told this is a time to repent, think of those in need, embrace diversity, cultivate humility and compassion, move beyond differences with the Palestinians, and choose the Two State solution.

Not a single word of praise for Judaism or American Jews. Not one. For that matter, after the first sentence, the word Jew does not appear, and Judaism is not mentioned by name at all. Obama doesn’t seem to like speaking about Jews or Judaism. (In his Ramadan message which is one hundred words shorter, the words Muslim and Islam are used seven times.)

Nancy and I hear (the shofar’s) call and are reminded by it that so much in our American heritage is drawn from the religious values enunciated during the Jewish High Holy Days…. The ties between the Jewish and American traditions run deep and are related in no small way to the special relationship that exists between the United States and Israel — a relationship based on the common spiritual and ethical values encompassed in the shofar’s call to prayer.

“Islam’s role in advancing justice, progress, tolerance, and the dignity of all human beings. … Islam has always been part of America and that American Muslims have made extraordinary contributions to our country.”

Obama seems to have a tin ear about how cartoonishly false his list of Muslim virtues sounds – it’s actually a list of what Islam is not. Yet these precise virtues are strikingly true of American Jews, for whom Obama had not a word of praise. On Rosh Hashanah Obama did not recall any Jewish contributions to America, while on Ramadan we were told Moslem contributions to America are ‘extraordinary.” Can you think of a single one? Can you imagine American medicine, physics, the space program, hi tech industry, finance industry, the entertainment industry from Bogey & Bacall to White Christmas, the civil rights movement…the list is endless… without Jews?

Obama praises “Islam’s role in advancing justice…and the dignity of all human beings.” Islam is world famous for its injustice. BHO has not a word of praise for Jewish justice. Yet the Hebrew Bible invented equality before the law, starting with Genesis where all humans are created equally in G-d’s image, and going on to teach in Leviticus 19, “Thou shalt not avenge, nor bear any grudge against the children of thy people, but thou shalt love thy neighbour as thyself,” and “Do not pervert justice; do not show partiality to the poor or favoritism to the great, but judge your neighbor fairly.” (Get that Justice Kagan?)

And for Christmas? When it comes to Christianity, Obama can’t even finish a complete sentence.